Charita Goshay: For kids in harm's way, compassion should not be conditional

Charita Goshay CantonRep.com staff writer @cgoshayREP

Wednesday

Jul 11, 2018 at 5:05 AM

The miraculous rescue of a boys' soccer team and their coach from a cave in Thailand is the feel-good summer story we needed.

Every now and then something comes along that rivets and engages us and has us all rooting for a Hallmark-movie ending.

But you don't get to cheer the rescue of 12 children in Thailand if you have no sympathy for the hundreds of refugee and migrant kids languishing here; you just don't.

As a result of their parents seeking asylum — something not against the law — children are being punished. Punitive attempts to keep families from fleeing countries filled with mayhem and chaos has exposed a staggering incompetence.

You get a receipt for your watch and wallet when you go to jail, even if you've killed someone, but not for your 2-year-old?

Surely, surely, a country that invented the PC, eradicated polio and landed men on the moon can create a humane system for handling undocumented families.

Fresh out

It has not gone unnoticed that some who lament that America is bereft of family values seem fresh out of compassion for immigrants seeking to remove their families from harm's way; the contention being that had parents not come here, their babies wouldn't be in cages.

But that would require us to ignore America's historical penchant for separating children from their families, from slavery, to so-called Indian schools to "civilize" them. It's one reason why kids today have legal rights.

Immigration critics point out that American citizens who get arrested are separated from their kids every day. But even a criminal suspect under most circumstances is informed as to where his or her children are being taken.

Besides, it won't work. Ain't no river wide enough, as the song goes, to stop a desperate mother who's seeking safety for her child.

If the caging of infants and children is just a hard matter of consequence, the same almost could be said of the boys in Thailand who had no business exploring a cave by themselves. But they did, and no one has suggested they not be rescued because they're getting what they deserve.

An American value

But compassion is part of the collective values that have helped to make America exceptional. What other country, for instance, has a Peace Corps? We give millions in foreign aid, not just for geopolitical advantage but also because it is the moral and quintessentially American thing to do.

The reason people from around the world are working to rescue the soccer team, and the reason the rest of us are hanging onto every development, is because refusing to help a suffering child is anathema.

If we're praying for their rescue while ignoring the plight of kids in our own communities, however, it calls us to do some serious soul-searching.

Can we really cheer for boys in Thailand while shrugging at kids getting disabilities from drinking toxic water in Flint?

According to Feeding America, 1.7 million Ohioans struggle against hunger, 525,000 of them children.

How does that happen in the world's richest country?

Even as we're preoccupied with the health of kids trapped half a world away, we're ignoring a recent attempt by the Trump administration to undermine a UN World Health Organization resolution supporting breast-feeding, on behalf of the baby-food industry that is pushing powdered milk. In poor countries where the water is bad, such a move could trigger a health crisis of generational proportions.

It took intervention by Russia — Russia — to put a stop to the threats and subterfuge.

We can't save every child in the world, but the mistreatment of children in our name, and our ambivalence about it, speaks more about how our values might be circling the drain than anything else.

Reach Charita at 330-580-8313 or charita.goshay@cantonrep.com

On Twitter: @cgoshayREP

Never miss a story

Choose the plan that's right for you.
Digital access or digital and print delivery.